SAMSUNG BD-C5500 1080p Blu-ray Player

I waited a couple weeks to write this review because I really wanted to “settle in” with the BluRay player, it being my 1st dedicated BluRay player, and I surprised myself by NOT choosing a Sony! Sony of course invented BluRay itself, and it knows the technology better than anybody no doubt, but I could not get comfortable with any of their “budget priced” BluRay players by their advertising and reviews here, so I went with my “gut feeling” and bought the brand that I know best these days: Samsung!

Samsung, Samsung, Samsung, they are EVERYTHING and EVERYWHERE these days! I just bought a new Samsung high-end refrigerator/freezer with all the toys, especially that beautiful LED lighting they have and twin motors and systems for refrig and freezer compartments, which is a great idea and it works fantastic in practice. I also own three of their LED LCD HDTV’s, one 40″ for my studio, another 40″ for my Mom’s room, and a third in the front room that is 46″, so we’re all Samsung HDTV’s here.

It was the experiences with the HDTV’s that brought me to this BluRay player, with its myriad features and apps and abilities, and frankly I am stunned that it works so gosh darn well! I have tried to find a weakness in the system for two straight weeks, and the player just laughs at me about it, so Kudos to Samsung for getting this model Right As RAIN! There is, of course one glaring flaw, and that is the lack of an actual keyboard, either virtual or otherwise with the system, so U-Tube is problematical unless you like generic content. Entering any search phrase or idea or topic is just incredibly difficult with the keystrokes required and Catch-22 “tricks” to using the remote for the keyboard, its replacement so be it, so I am NOT thrilled about that aspect of the player.

Other than the lack of a keyboard, virtual or otherwise, feature this BluRay player just ROCKS! The best thing I also discovered about it is that the Rosewill “Trident X Series” RNX-N1 802.11 N 2.0 WiFi adapter works a treat and trick with the BluRay player, so there was no need to spend $80 or so on the Samsung equivalent, and I mean that thing is PLUG and PLAY, end of discussion! What a nice accessory for a mere $25! It really works fantastic with the player’s streaming features, as I can attest to having ZERO problems with content of any type with the Rosewill in the house! Using the player for Netflix, Vudu, or Pandora streaming content of all types just ROCKS my house!

I invested in a Toslink cable to handle the sound specifically, and it’s Good Good GOOD! All I do is turn down the TV to its lowest setting, not muted mind you because that can create a bottleneck with the system, click my 3-port Toslink switch from Nyrius, (the Nyrius “Digital Audio Optical” switch that you can get here at Amazon.com for about $20) so that the BluRay player is selected out of my 3 input sources (HDTV Cable box, PC sound card, and the BluRay player) and BAM! I am stylin’ with Dolby 5.1 THX Surround Sound from my Logitech Z-5500 digital audio 550W RMS speaker system! I mean the sound is realistic with BluRay movies to the point you think that the action is going on right there in the room with you, so it’s reallllly nice to use the Toslink feature with the BluRay player.

That comes in especially handy for streaming Pandora Radio commercial free content, to boot, and I love my Pandora so it gets used a LOT for that feature alone here in my studio. I have several nice “stations” figured out there, Hendrix Radio, Cream Radio, Thievery Corporation Radio, etc and choosing one of those with the BluRay player Pandora App is just a total treat! I’ll have it on as “background music” while I work at some task here, be it photography, composing audio or video tracks, whatever, and it sets the mood nicely via the BluRay player, something you wouldn’t expect to be a much-used feature of this player, but it is with me!

I put on a Vudu movie the 1st night I had the BluRay player set up, the “Free Promotional” movie that they allow you once you set up your account with them and all the ducks are in line so to speak, and we chose “Tron The Legacy”, and man alive 75….that movie ROCKED the place! With the optical audio and the HDTV video through my Samsung 40″ LED LCD HDTV here in the studio we were totally enthralled with the dimension, overall fantastic picture and sound, and the clarity was just stunning! I could not tell streaming video from an actual disc in the player, you dig? What nice quality Vudu has going for it, so once a week we pick a special movie from Vudu’s racks and watch it here together, my wife and I do this, and it’s mucho specialized and wonderful to experience!

If there was going to be a “test” of the Rosewill adapter it was with THAT movie, and suffice to say the Rosewill WiFi streamed everything perfect, no question about it, that set the tone for the coming sessions through the 1st two weeks I’ve had this BluRay player, and it just performed fantastic! The system has auto-updated three times since I hooked everything up, you know the software in the machine, and firmware too, it has updated BOTH via WiFi and no issues there at all! It’s just a seamless thing to go through with the auto-update feature, and nobody has to be afraid of it. Just let the system cycle through its motions, restarting the machine one or two times depending on whether it’s software or firmware/software both being updated, and its over with before you know it. So Kudos to the Samsung BluRay auto-update feature too!

You know I like the style of the player too, it’s simple, nice, and clean looking without a lot of buttons and controls on the front, so it fits in well with my other electronics in my credenza here in the studio, and I DO LIKE the touch-sensitive controls! They are NIIIICE! Mostly I use the remote to control things with the player, but once in awhile I’ll use the touch buttons in the right, front of the player on its little title “bar” of metal against cool black plastic construction of the player, and BAM! Works a treat, and there’s no doubt what you are doing because it confirms the dialog on-screen too.

The player turns my Samsung HDTV “On” every time I turn the BluRay player “On” also, another nice feature of the system from Samsung between HDTV and BluRay player, so there’s integration there that makes it nice to have the same brand, it seems, which is another good thing. And back to that remote for the BluRay player…since I’ve had the player installed I have not used my TV remote once, how about that for statistics! Well I take that back, I had to use it to select the “switch” I have (KVM switch) for my HDTV because I have so many things connected to it, ie my cable TV box and DVR system, my PC, my PowerMac G5 server (M9591LL/A), the BluRay player, and I also have a live camera “feed” into the HDTV for when I am composing video, so I can “frame” my subjects correctly and have horizontal and vertical alignment with the project’s focus to speak of, and the Samsung HDTV only has 4 connectors for HDMI 2.1, thus I have to use a KVM switch and sorting that out sometimes requires the use of the TV’s remote, which I alluded to above. So one time I had to use the HDTV remote, the rest of the time I used the Samsung BluRay player remote, and it suffices for all functions for the HDTV until you get into sub menus and special features, of course, but the remote is adequate for both BluRay player and HDTV use, both.

One thing does puzzle me about the player, and that is the WiFi adapter from Rosewill doesn’t function on the front USB port, and I was curious about that, so I called Samsung about it and they told me the rear port is connected directly via some switch on the player’s motherboard to the WiFi system while the front USB port is not! How about that? So that is why you can’t get the WiFi adapter you might have to work there, it’s best to hook it up to the rear port, in fact ONLY to that rear port of the system. What else…

Overall I have to give this little BluRay player, which cost all of $100 or so after Amazon.com’s discounts are applied, a solid Wavey Davey 5-Star Award, I mean there’s nothing that is perfect in this world with electronics, but the player comes awfully close to that sanction! If it only had a semblance of a keyboard somehow, someway, some method either on-screen and virtual or ‘live’ and tactile on the remote itself, the player would not get any flack from anybody. But I can understand why people get frustrated with punching in keystrokes for letters and numerals and special characters on that keypad of the remote, as it IS difficult and specific and it is hard to control accuracy also, so a genuine problem there for the device not solvable easily, or in fact any way I know of, we are out of luck there unfortunately.

Other than the keyboard issue this thing ROCKS OUT! It’s certainly worth the $100 price of admission, and even though it’s last year’s model to be honest about it, there is something about it that renders a complete BluRay player experience and then some, with all the possibilities with streaming video from the various sources, and DLNA if you get that figured out (I have not gotten into that yet), plus all those apps from Samsung for the games, the entertainment of all sorts from movies to audio from Pandora, it’s all good! This is a player that does a LOT more than it’s advertised for, I mean for a $100 device like it is, this thing puts out the $300 feature set and then some, plus we get to skimp on price and the Rosewill adapter allows us to skimp on the WiFi too!

You know I actually *did* play the requisite BluRay feature through the BluRay player once this past week, and of course it was Avatar, the ultimate test of any BluRay player, and it shone through that exam like a Straight “A” Student. So yes, even for the mundane assignment of playing a BluRay disc on the player it’s letter perfect and sublime if you use the optical sound hook up and/or have a great surround system emanating from your HDTV…perhaps. Mine is “live” through the Logitech Z-5500 Digital 550W RMS THX Dolby 5.1 Speaker System and it’s simply awe-inspiring, there is no other description that fits it!

There you have it, my review is finished for the Samsung BD-C-5500 (?) BluRay player, it’s a wrap! I can only recommend this set to you if you understand the shortcomings 100%, and that is centered chiefly around the lack of an actual or virtual keyboard for the device, but other than that it’s a 100% “Go for it” purchase, no doubt about it! It’s certainly worthy of its minor-league price, and it delivers nothing but Big League action all around, a win-win situation for the owners of these BluRay multi-media systems…yes, that is it, it’s not just a BluRay player at all, it’s a complete multi-media system and it works 110% to earn your trust and loyalty so to speak, never really disappointing but in the one specific area of the lack of a keyboard.

For the price and features you cannot beat this with two sticks and a hammer…it is DA BOMB, and with the one reservation above I recommend it 110% to the good. Go get yours today!

Wavey Davey – 4-28-2011

This is my first Blu-Ray player and I am very happy with it. The Blu-Ray picture quality is great, and it even seems to improve quality on normal DVDs compared to my old DVD player. Online applications (especially Netflix, Pandora, Vimeo) are very nice, in addition to Sudoku and Texas Hold Em apps. It integrates well with my Samsung TV, and turning on the player will automatically switch the TV to the proper input (although I could see how this could be annoying if you didn’t want to switch immediately, for example if you just want to eject a disc while you’re watching TV or something) and the Samsung TV remote works for the Blu-Ray, and vice-versa. The remote itself is pretty good, as far as remotes go, but it could be laid out better. Load times for discs wasn’t instant, but is much quicker than a Sony PS3. The Samsung hardware is virtually silent, very slim and extremely easy to use. There is a USB port right on front that will play media directly from your thumb drive or an external hard disk, but be aware that you may need to use an external power source for some devices.

There are a few cons, though. Setting up online accounts for Picasa was a little confusing, you have to log into Samsung then attach the account, then log in again, and you can’t do it from within the app itself but must do it from the settings menu. The main menu has 5 internet apps shown by default, and these are put there by Samsung and can’t be changed. I have to go past the Facebook app (which I’ll never use) to get to Pandora (which I use daily) and can’t add the Weather app to the default list at all, even though I use it daily and have it marked as a favorite. There is no way to uninstall apps at all. The app store is very limited, and while there are some good ones in there, most of them are pretty lame. Hopefully, this will be improved later on, but for now there aren’t too many good ones available. Playing audio and video files from USB or network isn’t bad, but some video types were unsupported, and creating a playlist or doing a search doesn’t seem to be possible.

Overall this is a solid player with great picture quality, fast load times, and a generally intuitive interface/remote. The only real complaints that I have are all related to the internet apps, and hopefully this will be improved with software updates for the device. Since most other Blu-Ray players in this price range don’t even support internet apps, it’s better than nothing. Overall, this is a very solid player and I’ve been very happy with it during its first month of use.